I blog about environmental and social justice issues because I am very concerned about the health of the interdependent web of life of which we are a part.

Melting Arctic ice.......beautiful and frightening!

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Saturday, February 26, 2011

El Savador

http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/features/2011/02/2011213174138761638.html
While debate about whether climate change is real or not continues in the US, the world's leading producer of CO2 emissions per capita, those already living with the effects, like Jose Domingo Cruz in El Salvador, don't have time to debate.  "Our storms are increasing in number and intensity," Cruz, a member of his community Civil Protection Committee that responds to community needs during natural disasters, told Al Jazeera while standing on a levy that ruptured during Tropical Storm Agatha last year. "All of us attribute this to climate change."
...the people are, however, forming a movement that is learning to protect and sustain itself in the increasingly chaotic world of global climate change and its severe ramifications on people, the environment, and local economies.
"Local communities are on the front-lines of climate change, and many local organisations like the Mangrove Association are offering the only significant response to this very serious problem," Nathan Weller of EcoViva told Al Jazeera. "Communities like those in the Bay of Jiquilisco can no longer rely solely on the conventional development model to intervene for them. They live the effects of climate change, are working actively on solutions to confront them, and the Mangrove Association serves to catalyse these efforts." 
In what has become a major grassroots social movement that aims to increase diversified sustainable farming, organic foods, food security, and all of this via environmentally friendly methods, many people living in this area are actually seeing their lives improve, despite the challenges.
We could learn something from these folks in El Savador.

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